During the second innings of the final of the 1983 cricket World Cup, West Indies batsman Vivian Richards found himself face-to-face with Indian all-rounder Madan Lal for the second time that innings. A few overs earlier, Richards had hit three of Lal’s deliveries to the boundary. This was the over in which Richards miscalculated, and Kapil Dev, playing off Lal’s delivery, took his now-famous running-catch. Lal took 17 wickets that tournament. In this essay from Vimal Kumar’s The Cricket Fanatics Essential Guide, Lal returns to his time on the 1983 squad and also sends out words of encouragement to the current team.
25 June 1983 was such an incredible day of our lives. Cricket was always a major sport in this country ever since I started playing serious cricket, but it achieved the status of a mass game only after the first World Cup championship won by our team. There are countless memorable moments from the Prudential World Cup, yet three images are indelible and unforgettable.
The first is of Kapil Dev with the trophy at Lord’s;the second is of the players getting their medals; and the third, of course, is of the wicket of Vivian Richards.
That ball has been so profound. In the last three decades, I have spoken so much about that famous ball alone that a book could have been written by now! Anyway, there is no doubt that Richards’s dismissal has been my moment of cricketing immortality. I bowled close to 10,000 balls in international cricket and never imagined that one ball would be spoken of a million times!
Over the last few years, I have come to realize that no matter what we do or where we go in our lives, we (our team) will always be remembered and defined by the ’83 victory, and I by that Richards dismissal. Years later, whenever Richards met me, he teased me lightheartedly: ‘Stay away from me, maan! I don’t want to see you!’ Truth be told, Viv was one of the few batsmen that I feared bowling to. His was a massive and intimidating presence. The kind of damage Ricky Ponting inflicted on the Indian team in the 2003 World Cup final, Richards would have easily done to us on that day. Of course, I did ask my captain to give me an extended spell against him when he was hitting all of us all over the park; however, it wasn’t so much from confidence but more from a typical Punjabi josh (vigour) that I could do the job. Nobody can claim or predict that he would get rid of someone like Richards at will or in a planned way, but I believe that it was our day!
I am not someone who remembers individual statistics or gives them much importance, but I have been reminded so many times about my average, strike rate and economy rate that it is difficult to forget now. Having said that, I still feel and truly believe that all the records and individual contributions would have been worthless if we had not won the Cup. The beauty of a trophy win like World Cup is that everyone gets recognition as a champion, regardless of his big or small contributions. Team members will fondly recall every little single, dismissal, fielding effort, even a joke shared during the match. Every four years, due to this win, I become young again.
They say it is important to dream to accomplish something special in life, but our trophy win was not even a dream! We could not even think of a World Cup win at that time. I bowled the first ball of the first World Cup, but did not play in the next (1979) tournament; I could never possibly imagine that we would be Champions in 1983.
If there is one thing that will always separate us from the future teams, it is the element of pressure and expectations. There was hardly any pressure on us. I do not think any Indian team has played with such low expectations post-1983. Some of the formidable names of international cricket and mighty teams of the era were participating in that tournament and no one gave us a chance! And that was an advantage for us. We had nothing to lose. One could afford to be intrepid and adventurous.
In hindsight, probably the tour of the West Indies in 1982 helped us in many ways. We did manage to win a few matches on one of the toughest tours and it sharpened our preparation for the tournament. However, it wasn’t until the semi-finals that we believed that we could go all the way, and finally it was once we managed to beat the home team, England, that our team started to believe that we could actually go all the way.
It took us a while to realize what we had achieved. More importantly, the victory means so much for Indian cricket. I have enjoyed watching the likes of Tendulkar and Dhoni and Sehwag, and before the 2011 World Cup, they used to say that they wanted to replicate what we had achieved. It was so touching.
The 1983 win inspired future generations to be aspirational. It gave them the belief that India could be world-beaters. The on-field success empowered the officials of the BCCI, who would then go on to make the game a great success commercially.
Before the 2011 World Cup, I had said that despite the perceived shortcomings, India had the wherewithal to win the World Cup and my opinion is the same for the 2015 World Cup. It will be the greatest challenge of Dhoni’s captaincy career, but I believe that he is well-equipped to handle this pressure.
The 2011 victory by Dhoni’s boys has once again turned the spotlight on us. Some people wondered whether our victory would no longer be so special and I tell them that appreciation for us and our importance have not been affected at all. One day, it would be nice to sit together with the 2011 and 1983 teams. That kind of meeting would be special. 1983 started a revolution in Indian cricket. No one can deny the role of our victory in shaping Indian cricket into what it is today.
In 2015, India can defend the title. They have a very good ODI side and people should not confuse the leadership skills of M.S. Dhoni in ODI cricket and Test cricket. He is a supremely confident man in this format and an accomplished ODI batsman, and so is Virat Kohli. But, make no mistake, if anyone thinks that one individual alone can win you the trophy, he or she is wrong. Even the great Tendulkar could not do it singlehandedly in the past. In order to win the World Cup, each and every member of the team is important and there has to be shared responsibility and vital contributions.
An excerpt from The Cricket Fanatics Essential Guide by Vimal Kumar. Reproduced with the permission of Hachette India.